Friday, April 18, 2014
Survival Is the Saudi Key Word
By Nicola Nasser*
Survival is the key word to understand the Saudi dynasty’s latest
external and internal policies. These are designed to pre-empt change but
paradoxically they are creating more enemies in a changing world order marked
by turbulent regional geopolitics and growing internal demands for change.
The seventy-year old strategic oil for security US-Saudi alliance seemed
about to crack on its 69th anniversary ahead of the summit meeting of
US President Barak Obama and king Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz in March.
With the US
Former US
The Saudis could not trust the US’ “regime change” strategy in the
region, which depends on the Muslim Brotherhood International
(MBI) as an instrument of change, sponsored by a regional rival like Turkey and a co-member of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), like
Qatar, which has been for long contesting the Saudi leadership of the GCC, the
Saudi leading role in Arab politics and the Saudi political representation of
Sunni Muslims.
This trilateral alliance of Qatar ,
Turkey and the MBI would
develop into a real threat to Saudi’s survival if it was allowed to deliver
change in Syria , Iraq , Egypt ,
Yemen , Lebanon , Tunisia ,
Libya Saudi Arabia
The US pillar of Saudi security now seems to be in doubt as the United
States stands unable to meet Saudi expectations on almost all the most critical
issues in the Middle East, from the Arab-Israeli conflict to the Saudi-Iran
conflict and the ongoing bloody conflict in Syria, let alone the conflict with
the MBI, especially in Egypt.
Within this context, using the MBI as an instrument for “regime change”
in the region has created a Saudi MBI phobia. Change is overdue in the kingdom,
but, after decades of intensive Islamic education, change could only come
camouflaged in Islamist form.
“It might seem ironic for a Wahhabi theocracy to oppose so forcefully a
party that mixes religion with politics. But it is precisely because the
monarchy bases its legitimacy on Islam that it fears Brotherhood rivalry,”
journalist Roula Khalaf wrote in the Financial Times in March.
Obama doesn’t seem capable of mending the bilateral fences. His refusal
to fight Saudi regional wars reminds them that he is the same man who as a
state senator back in 2002 stated that:
“Let's fight to make sure our so-called allies in the Middle East - the
Saudis and the Egyptians - stop oppressing their own people, and suppressing
dissent, and tolerating corruption and inequality, and mismanaging their
economies.”
However, as demonstrated by Obama’s visit to the kingdom on March 28,
the bilateral differences will remain tactical, while the strategic alliance
will hold until the kingdom finds a credible alternative to its American
security guarantor, although this seems an unrealistic development in the
foreseen future.
Regional Shifts
Regionally, the kingdom is not faring better. The US-promoted and
Saudi–advocated anti-Iran “front” of regional “moderates,” with Israel
The Saudi call for converting the GCC “council” into a “union” is now
dead.
Saudi invitation to Jordan
and Morocco to join the GCC
was unwelcome by other GCC members and by Morocco
In Bahrain
The latest Kuwait-hosted Arab summit meeting did not see eye to eye with
Saudi on Syria
Forming a Lebanese government without Hezbullah and its pro-Syria
coalition has failed.
Meanwhile, the kingdom continues to deal with Iran
In the background, the Israeli threat could never be overlooked.
Self-confidence Challenged
Using petrodollars
as soft power to gain influence abroad and
secure loyalty internally, the kingdom seems self-confident enough, or
overconfident, to feel secured on its own.
Speaking
at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg ,
Virginia , on March 11, Prince Turki al–Faisal, chairman
of the King Faisal
Center for Research & Islamic
Studies in Riyadh and former Saudi Ambassador to
the US
“Saudi Arabia represents over 20% of the combined GDP of the Middle
East-North Africa (MENA) region (and over a quarter of
the Arab World’s GDP) making it … an effective partner and member of the G20.
“The Saudi stock market represents over 50% of the entire stock market
capitalization of the MENA region.
“The Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA), the Kingdom’s central bank,
is the world’s third largest holder of net foreign assets … Last but not least,
Saudi Aramco, the Kingdom’s national oil company, is the world’s largest
producer and exporter of petroleum and has by far the world’s largest sustained
production capacity infrastructure.”
However, veteran journalist Karen Elliot House, has presented
a starkly ominous picture.
“Sixty percent of Saudis are 20 or younger, most of whom have no hope of a job,” House wrote in her 2012 book. “Seventy percent
of Saudis cannot afford to own a home. Forty percent live below the poverty
line. The royals, 25,000 princes and princesses, own most of the valuable land
and benefit from a system that gives each a stipend and some a fortune. Foreign
workers make the Kingdom work; the 19 million Saudi citizens share the Kingdom
with 8.5 million guest workers.”
According to House, regional differences are “a daily fact of Saudi life.” Hejazis
in the West and Shiites in the East resent the strict Wahhabi lifestyle. Gender discrimination is a growing
problem. Sixty percent of Saudi college graduates are women but they account
for only twelve percent of the work force.
Moreover, according to Anthony H. Cordesman, published by the Center for
Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) on April 21, 2011, “There are serious
gaps between ‘haves’ and ‘have nots,’ regional differences in wealth and
privilege, and tensions between Saudi Shi’ites and Saudi Sunnis.”
The kingdom has been squandering billions upon billions of
petrodollars in a lost battle to finance a regional counterrevolution. Some
$20bn dollars were pledged to bailout Bahrain Ukraine
To contain the repercussions of the Arab uprisings internally, the
Kingdom has already spent even more on buying the loyalty of its own people;
for the same purpose twenty Royal Orders, which were economically
dominated, were issued in March 2011.
In February 2011, King Abdullah pledged more than $35 billion for
housing, salary increases for state employees, studying abroad and social
security. The next month the king announced another financial package worth
more than $70 billion for more housing units, religious establishment and
salary increase for military and security forces.
Bailing the population out of protests economically seemed not enough to
secure internal stability as the kingdom, instead of relaxing the internal
situation, has recently tightened the screws with the issuing of the Penal
Law for Crimes of Terrorism and Its Financing on last January 31, the Royal
Decree No. 44, which criminalizes “participating in hostilities outside the
kingdom,” three days later and on March 7 the Interior Ministry’s “initial”
list of groups the government considers terrorist organizations, both inside
and around the country and both Sunni and Shiite.
“These recent laws and regulations turn almost any critical expression
or independent association into crimes of terrorism,” said Joe Stork, the
deputy director of the Human Rights Watch for the Middle East and North Africa region. “These regulations dash any hope
that King Abdullah intends to open a space for peaceful dissent or independent
groups,” Stork added.
Internally and externally, the kingdom overconfidently seems intent on
creating more enemies, neutralizing none, alienating world and regional powers,
mainstream Sunni, Shiite, liberal, pan-Arab and leftist forces, wrecking
regional havoc, all in what looks like an unbalanced reaction to threats, real
and perceived, to the survival of the ruling dynasty. However, the kingdom
seems like shooting its survival in the legs.
* Nicola Nasser is a veteran Arab journalist based in Birzeit, West Bank
of the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories (nassernicola@ymail.com). An edited
version of this article was first published by Middle East Eye on April 15,
2014.
